Anne Urquhart (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Fair Work Amendment Bill 2014. Labor opposes this bill in its entirety. It is unfair, it is divisive and it will do nothing to boost workplace productivity or relations between employers and employees. The bill would open the door for basic award conditions, like penalty rates, to be traded away. It would also make it harder for employees to enact their right to representation.

Prime Minister Abbott has consistently promised that Work Choices is dead, but of course—as Australians have learnt the hard way—the Prime Minister and the Liberals cannot be trusted to keep their promises. They cannot be trusted with health, they cannot be trusted with education, they cannot be trusted with our national broadcaster, they cannot be trusted not to bring in new taxes, they cannot be trusted with community services, they cannot be trusted with pensions, they cannot be trusted with the welfare safety net and they most certainly cannot be trusted to protect Australian workers.

If Work Choices is dead and buried, as Prime Minister Tony Abbott has said, we clearly have a case of zombie policy rising up to wreak havoc on the working people of Australia. The truth is that this bill is a blatant continuation of the Liberals' ongoing and consistent agenda of attacking employment conditions and eroding industrial protections in this country. Though this bill, and on many other fronts, the government is clearly trying to take up where Work Choices left off.

At a time when Australia's wage growth has hit a wall and Australian workers are struggling to ensure that their pay keeps pace with the cost of living, this government is trying to hit them even harder. And yet, despite the indisputable facts, those opposite have dragged out the same mistruths and scare tactics to try to convince the community that Australians need to be paid less. Only last year, Senator Abetz was talking about wage explosions that, if left unchecked, would push thousands of Australians out of work. This is an absolutely outrageous claim that has no basis in reality, as Mr Abetz would undoubtedly be aware. The hubris of a man who can tell the Australian people a fib in his attempt to lower their take-home pay and their standard of living is shameful. That he would try to convince the Australian people that this is actually in their best interests is truly breathtaking.

Back in the real world, economists—and anyone with more than a passing understanding of current economic matters—know that wages growth is the lowest that it has ever been. The Australian Bureau of Statistics told us in December that, at 2.6 per cent, annual wage growth had barely outperformed inflation in the year to 2014. But remember that this is an average, and in many industries employees are finding that their salary no longer pays for the same things it did just a year ago. A recent Business Day survey found that many experts and economists do not expect things to get much better in 2015. CBA economist Michael Workman expects inflation of 2.7 per cent, with wage growth of just 2.2 per cent; Professor Jakob Madsen of Monash University expects inflation of 2.5 per cent and wage growth of 2.2 per cent; and Saul Eslake from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Shane Oliver from AMP and Tom Skladzien of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union expect zero real wage growth.

Despite this, the Abbott government persists in launching another attack on the conditions of Australian workers. Despite stalled wages and the increasing difficulty that working Australians are having making ends meet, this government wants to put more power in the hands of employers. Clearly this government is in a race to the bottom on standards in industrial relations. Rather than trying to build a balanced and stable industrial relations system, this government has launched yet another attack on workers. The provisions in this bill are fundamentally unfair—a feature which is almost becoming a hallmark of legislation developed by the Abbott government. This is a government that consistently and continuously hits out at those who have the least, while handing out favours to those who have the most. It has back-flipped on its promise to install laws to address tax avoidance measures employed by multinational companies and at the same time it is commissioning an industrial relations review which will include penalty rates and the minimum wage.

This government consistently and repeatedly hits those who are least able to take the blow, those who are least able to speak out on their own behalf and those who already have the toughest lots in Australian life. Those with wealth are spared the burden of budget cuts. Those with social and political power are privileged in legislation. The reality is that the people who are likely to be impacted the most by these changes have the least capacity to argue their case and the smallest amount of leverage to achieve outcomes. Women, particularly, will be worse off, as they are more likely to be on a minimum wage than men. There are more women in industries like hospitality, community work, child care and cleaning which will be exposed to the provisions in this bill. Similarly, low-paid workers, workers with limited access to formal education and other vulnerable Australians would be left unrepresented or at the mercy of unscrupulous employers.

The government has told us that this bill is merely the delivery of an election promise to implement the recommendations of Labor's 2012 Fair Work Act review, but the truth is that the bill before us today goes much, much further. In fact, the provisions of this bill serve to undermine fundamental work and representation rights that are integral to Australia's industrial relations system. The government has misled the Australian people by trying to represent the antiworker provisions as being just the fulfilment of the expert panel's recommendations. This simply is not true. This bill clearly oversteps any mandate the government try to pretend they have. And Australian workers will be the ones to pay the price.

One of the biggest concerns is the government's plans for individual flexibility arrangements, or IFAs. It was Labor that introduced IFAs, in 2009. They were designed to create a framework that would allow for genuine flexibility—the flexibility for parents to make arrangements with their employer that would allow them to pick up their children from school or take time to care for ageing parents, for example. But Labor's individual flexibility agreements came with strong safeguards to protect workers. Firstly, there was a requirement for genuine agreement between workers and their employers on the terms of the agreement. Secondly, and very importantly, the agreement needed to satisfy the 'better-off overall' test. That is to say, the employee must be better-off overall as a result of the provisions contained in the agreement. This is an important safeguard that protects conditions from being traded away by unscrupulous employers. But the legislation before us today will weaken the 'better-off overall' test. In doing so, it abandons the safeguards when it comes to what can be traded away under an individual flexibility agreement.

This bill also includes provisions to allow non-monetary payments to be taken into account when considering whether an employee actually is better-off. Remember, the government are making these changes on the basis that they are merely fulfilling the recommendations of the expert panel. But the expert panel was very explicit on the matter of non-monetary payments, saying that, if a non-monetary benefit is being traded for a monetary benefit, the value of the monetary benefit forgone must be relatively insignificant and the value of the non-money benefit is proportionate. They are three simple words—relatively, insignificant and proportionate—but three simple words with big implications for workers' employment conditions when they are removed.

Equally, we could see employees left with little choice but to forgo their rights to penalty rates for working antisocial hours or they may be forced to drastically alter their working hours. Clearly, this distorts the original intention of these individual flexibility agreements beyond recognition. And clearly it means that Senator Abetz was wrong when he said of the bill that it:

… implements our publically stated policy – nothing more, nothing less.

It is here that we start to see the government's real intent. It is not about fulfilling the will of the expert panel. It is not about the government keeping their word to Australian voters—because, goodness knows, they have paid no heed to that in so many other areas. What it is about is removing protections from Australian workers. Government members have said that these changes are needed to bring flexibility to the system. Unfortunately for the government, and for the strength of their argument, it seems business does not agree. In fact, less than one per cent of employers believe that IFAs are too inflexible, according to a survey undertaken by Fair Work Australia in 2011. So not only are the government attacking Australian workers, but they are doing it to address a problem that does not even exist. It is clear from this that the government are not trying to make for a better workplace system but rather are fabricating problems in order to fulfil their fundamental agenda of attacking workers.

But this bill goes further, by requiring employees to sign a 'genuine needs statement' agreeing that they will be better-off as a result of the agreement. While this sounds like a reassuring measure, in practice it will offer employers a ready-made defence against any future claims that they may have contravened a flexibility term in the agreement. In practice, it would be a very brave employee who would refuse to sign these agreements if they had any fears that their job might be the casualty of their refusal. This is particularly relevant in industries or areas with high unemployment or in entry level positions where employees have much less bargaining power. As Associate Professor Rae Cooper at the University of Sydney's Business School put it very well, in The Age recently:

Frankly, how will a mother seeking flexibility to fit with care arrangements and who is desperate for her job manage to genuinely negotiate on an individual basis?

So, far from being an employee protection, it is clear this provision could offer an alibi to unscrupulous employers who wish to take advantage of unsuspecting employees.

Another big problem with this bill is that it attempts to diminish the ways that unions can communicate with their members, through changes to the right-of-entry provisions. We on this side of the chamber believe it is the right of all employees to decide whether they join a union or not. We also believe in balance—that right-of-entry provisions should not be tilted towards either unions or employers.

However, this government has dispensed with any notions of balance in this bill. Of course, it will come as no surprise that the Abbott government's changes in this area are heavily weighted to employers. And, again, we can see that what the government promised to do is very different to what they are actually doing. Before the election, the coalition said they would adopt recommendation 35 of the expert panel, which gives greater power to Fair Work Australia to resolve workplace disputes about the frequency of visits. However, the government's inclusion of a provision that requires the Fair Work Commission to consider the 'combined impact on the employer's operations' is clearly intended to exclude all unions from a site if only one union has been found to have entered too frequently. This bill would make it harder, or even impossible, for workers to have discussions with their union representatives in their own time at work. It will also enable employers to nominate unreasonable places for workers to meet their union representatives. This is a case of 'punish one, punish all.' This bill proposed go far beyond the expert panel's recommendations and is clearly intended to exclude unions and restrict people's capacity to act on their right to union representation. Clearly, the government is trying to restrict access for unions to worksites.

Another very concerning aspect of this bill is the amendments to greenfield agreements. These provisions pave the way for certain groups of employers in industries such as mining and construction to essentially negotiate with themselves. The amendments allow for the ludicrous situation where one party—unions—would simply be removed from the negotiating table if difficulties arise in the course of negotiations. Employers are given absolute advantage in negotiating by allowing them to choose which unions they want to negotiate with. After the negotiations begin, the employer can then at any time call a notified negotiation period. They then simply have to sit back and wait. Once it starts, this countdown clock does not stop. An employer could essentially walk away from the negotiating table and wait for the three months of negotiations to expire.

If they cannot reach agreement with the union within three months, they are then entitled to write their own workplace agreement with or without the support of the unions and their employees. At the end of the three months, the employer—and only the employer—could take a proposed agreement to the Fair Work Commission for assessment and approval. Essentially, the employer will negotiate with themselves and unsurprisingly they will find that they are in furious agreement with themselves. This is absurdity of the highest order and would not be out of place in a Monty Python sketch. It is no way to bring fairness into Australia's industrial relation system. This provision will allow employers to trample all over their workers' rights with absolutely no checks and balances to limit the excesses of some greedy employers. This is just another reason that Labor opposes this bill.

The government has said this bill is necessary, but the truth is that Australia has one of the strongest, fairest and most successful industrial relations systems in the world thanks to the reforms of the previous Labor government. When it was introduced, we were told that the Fair Work Act would undermine productivity, cause untold industrial disputes and pummel productivity outcomes. We were told by the Business Council in The Australian that the Fair Work Act had:

… unleashed an adversarial culture which has resulted in a rising number of disputes and unreasonable claims.

So let us look at the outcomes. What has actually happened under the Fair Work Act? Let us look at industrial disputes. Those opposite told us these would spiral because unions would be interfering with areas that were none of their business. The facts tell a very different story. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2013 was the second lowest year for industrial disputes since records began. So much for claims it would lead to industrial chaos. Compared to the Howard era, industrial disputes are at a remarkably low level. Why? Because Labor created a system that was fair to both parties. Clearly, this is part of the government's ongoing agenda to attack unions and drive down wages.

Earlier this month in this place, I shared a quote from Bernard Keane that I think is particularly relevant here again today. Mr Keane has captured the motivations of government members perfectly when he said:

The Fair Work Act has delivered significant labour productivity growth and moderate — at the moment, low — wage growth, with industrial disputation far below the average level of the Howard years, suggesting it's not real-world outcomes that the Coalition is concerned about in IR, but business bottom lines.

Indeed.

But really, we should not be surprised. It is in their DNA. Those opposite have a long history of relentlessly attacking the rights of Australian workers and attempting to shackle the unions that represent them. In 2004, they did not tell the Australian people their plans to introduce WorkChoices and AWAs. In 2005, they told the Australian people their pay and conditions were protected by law when they were not. In 2008, Mr Tony Abbott said WorkChoices:

… was good for wages, it was good for jobs, and it was good for workers. And let's never forget that.

Things have not got much better with this appalling government.

This government's highly ideological commission of audit recommended that the minimum wage go backwards by one per cent a year in real terms for a decade, which is a move that would entrench poverty and take the minimum wage back to its 1998 level. This government promised not to touch penalty rates and then gave the Productivity Commission open slather to look at this and many other aspects of industrial relations which we were told were off the table. This government extended a royal commission into the trade union movement for a year without the royal commissioner asking for it.

This government never was, and never will be, a friend of the workers. From the moment they gained power, they have set out on a systematic path to lower the conditions of Australian workers. I urge senators to fight back against this vindictive agenda and back millions of Australian workers by voting against this rhetoric bill, this backward bill, this bill that will not enhance workers in any shape or form. It will not add to productivity in this country.